I was a little late deciding to enter this event and after making my mind up that I wanted to fish it I initially struggled to find a partner. It wasn't until I made an appeal to the chaps on the CRT England Facebook page that I finally found one in Ian Whittaker, and am I ever glad he stepped in. I'd met Ian previously on a Tusses match and at the CRT event and from what I had seen he was a methodical and competent, accurate lure angler with a fair bit of experience on the water. Little did I know that not only was he going to prove to be a brilliant partner but he was also going to change the way I thought about canal lure fishing all round...
The LACC pairs open is arguably becoming one of the best canal events in the country. Not only do the LACC run a superb event but it attracts loads of great lure anglers from up and down the country and this was very evident when I looked around the hordes of anglers tackling up for what was to be a very competitive event. If haven't built up a proper picture of the field of this event already I should make it clear that some of the best canal light lure anglers were there and of them many were proper specialists that do this week in and week out. This was going to be hard...very hard.
As we touched base with friends enjoying the inclusive bacon butty and cup of tea, we nattered loose plans for the day ahead. I'd located Ian getting ready and we quickly ran over our idea of what to do. Ian, having much more experience of this stretch than I, suggested we head to a section that had produced for him in the past where we could work our way along to try and locate fish.
Registration done we all stood listening to the expectations of the organizers before being released at ten second intervals. This staggered kick off was intended to stop a melee ensuing at the start of the match. The conception and realization of this were two totally different things and even under the instructions that there was to be no running, the actual fact was that there was plenty of unsavory jockeying for position as at least two thirds of the competitors were heading the same way down a narrow tow path. Eventually the hordes thinned out as anglers stopped at spots they fancied and soon enough we to came to the area where Ian thought we should begin.
The fishing for our pair went very well considering my poor start. Whether nerves or my unfamiliarity was effecting my performance I couldn't say, but initially I struggled to settle and thus switched from lure to lure and from method to method trying to get that key and settling first pluck.
Literally I had gone through a very large part of my go to lure fishing armoury and had not had a single dink, pluck or enquiry. Ian, on the other hand had lost one zander and landed two perch as he covered the water. It was at this point that Ian stepped in to get me dialled in for the sake of our team. As he ran through exactly what he was doing that was making all the difference and showed me it working in the clear water it was like a switch had been thrown in my mind. I am by my own admission an aggressive angler in many of the facets of my fishing and obviously to me now I was being very aggressive in how I was fishing lures. Ian on the other hand was being very subtle and this subtly was inclining fish that would not go near my aggressively fished lures to strike. The epiphany that struck me was how many opportunities I had probably missed in some amazing spots by being too aggressive and how many times had I been on fish and just assumed they wouldn't feed, when in actual fact they would have taken if it weren't for the fact I was being too aggressive!
To say the change was dramatic was an understatement. Matching the method and the way it was fished quickly brought me into the foray and in no time at all we had gone from a few fish on our score sheet to having a full quota of zander and most of the perch. With both of us working close together we quickly pinned down some shoals of small zander and worked them into a frenzy where they were chasing our lures right up to the surface and snatching them before we could recast.
By 11am we had the full quota for both the perch and zander and a rough tally had us just over two meters. Therefore we were both in agreement that as we needed to just up-grade, we should up-scale our tactics. This actually worked and intermittently as we worked along the tow path we found and caught fish here and there, upgrading our scores by a couple of centimeters. The one concern for us both was or lack of any decent sized zander. Our perch average was as we expected 25+, but the zander were a bit on the small side with most of them being around 25-30cm. If we were in a unlimited competition we would have been in heaven as we were throwing back small zander at an alarming rate as they were not big enough to improve our score.
With so many anglers battering the water senseless I suppose there had to be a point where the pressure took its toll and the latter few hours of the match the whole water seemed to shut off; it kind of makes sense with so many chaps stomping up and down the tow path, lots of yelling and coloured lures flying here there and everywhere. In the later stages we scratched a few perch here and there but our morning's scores were ultimately our best and we hoped it would be enough to get us up into the top half of the rankings.
In the end the finish was tight and the four best perch and four best zander limits did as it was probably intended and stopped any one team from running away with the lead. The top eighteen teams scored over two meters and in the end mine and Ian's team, 'Nothing to see here', placed 13th overall with some great teams above and below us.
I have thought about our performance again and again and truthfully I wouldn't change a thing about it. We caught fish and filled the quotas! I suppose our main problem was the lack of length in the zander we caught, but you can't always chose the fish you catch. We did lose a decent fish each which might have made some difference, but I reckon nether would have jumped us into a placing position.
This turned out to be a really enjoyable well run event by the LACC and one I am penciling in on next year's calendar already. If it keeps growing in popularity and size it should quickly become the premier open event in the UK for canal lure fishing and the organizers should be very happy with what they have done.
Really, I have to end this write up by thanking Ian. You were an amazing partner for this event and the thing's I learnt from fishing with you will have further reaching effects than you will ever know. You have actually changed how I perceive predators feeding and hopefully this will help me in any future competitive endeavors and certainly will help chasing specimens in the future. If ever you need a partner for anything you know how to contact me and thanks again mate.
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